Coastguard official says grounded cargo ship has "weathered the winter well" in Lark Harbour

The MSC Baltic III is 207 metres long, which is almost twice the length of the Coast Guard’s largest icebreaker, the CGS Louis S. St-Laurent.

It’s been nearly a year since a cargo ship lost power and landed in an area known as “Cedar Cove” in Lark Harbour on February 15th. The MSC BALTIC lll is looking a little ‘broken’ and according to the Coast Guard it’s been one crazy year. Bruce English has been there since the start keeping an eye on the environment. A tender for the salvage has closed and English says they should hear within the next few weeks which company will do the vessel removal. 

The MSC Baltic III is 207 metres long, which is almost twice the length of the Coast Guard’s largest icebreaker, the CGS Louis S. St-Laurent. English says it’s a “significant” process to safely remove a vessel like this and looking at other incidents like this around the world, they take a long time to clean up. He says the salvage company has removed in excess of 1700 metric tonnes of fuel, whereby a lot of it had to be heated up for days and several times before the removal. They’ve also removed over 409 containers by crane and onto a barge, but English says it will be challenging to get the remaining 63 out since they have swelled and may have to come out on an angle. 

Meanwhile, English says the vessel has weathered the winter well, sinking more in the stern and bending more in the middle. He says he is “pleasantly surprised” the vessel is in one piece, but it has settled into the contours of the ocean floor resting in upwards of eight metres of water. With buckling on port and starboard side there has been no release of cargo or oil into the environment. English says a significant amount of debris was found onshore after the last weather event, which is expected following a storm. He says the remaining containers are carrying things like lentils, split peas and beans.